The SIGMA DP1 is the most fun $28 ever bought me.

xpatUSA wrote:

Fromveur wrote:

Archiver wrote:

allineedislight wrote:

well, the classic dp series obviously can't compete in terms of resolution with the Merrill and Quattro, but they are still my personal favourite in terms of color signature.

The DP2 classic renders skin tone very nicely, something that cannot be said from the Dp2 Merrill (in my opinion). The DP2 quattro is again different, but in terms of skin tone I prefer the Dp2 classic.

I vastly prefer the colour signatures of the original DP1 and DP2 to the DP2 Merrill. Early last year, I bought one of the remaining DP2M's in Australia because that window was almost closed, and I wanted what I hoped would be an updated DP camera. And in the last year and a half, I've been striving to like it, but ending up disappointed over and over.

May I ask you if, according to you, a DP1s or a DP1x has the same 'colour signature' as the original DP1...?

"Color signature" is a phrase that can mean almost anything, as can any answer you may get to your question.

Agreed - hence the quotation marks... Actually, @Archiver had used the phrase, as others before them, and I was just curious to know how they would compare the DP1s and the DP1x to the original DP1, with whatever meaning they give to 'colour signature'...

I'm under the impression that they share the same sensor, but I'm not sure, and the sensor is not everything

Yes, they share the same sensor.

OK, thank you for clarifying this.

... Moreover, to make things even more unclear in my mind, I'm confused by the analog front-end (AFE) - I don't know for sure when it was introduced, and this can surely deeply change things, even with the same sensor.

The DP1x and DP2x have AFEs. Also SD15 and all Quattros.

When an AFE is used, there is a Programmable Gain Amplifier between the sensor output and the ADC input. Changing ISO changes the gain, more for higher. The ADC output is therefore the same (more or less) for any ISO setting, all other things being equal.

When an AFE is not used, there is no amplification change between the sensor output and the ADC input. Instead, the ISO setting itself is sent to SPP which does the multiplication digitally during conversion. The ADC output therefore reduces as the ISO setting is increased.

The former is unpopular because the ADC output can easily get clipped even at higher ISO.

The latter is preferred by those who like to play it safe with more 'headroom' by shooting at 200+ ISO.

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"What we've got hyah is Failyah to Communicate": 'Cool Hand Luke' 1967.

Thank you very, very much, Ted, this is extremely helpful and informative. I appreciate that you took so much time to explain all this in details. Thanks!

It is funny and a little bit astonishing that an AFE was included in the Quattro cameras, whereas you deem this setup as 'unpopular'... You mentioned a drawback attached to the use of an AFE, but there must also probably be advantages, otherwise people would not be using them at all? I mean, if one could entirely reproduce an AFE on the post-processing software side, without the drawbacks it brings when used on the hardware side (in-camera), what would be the point of a hardware-embedded AFE...?

Thanks again for your crystal-clear explanations.